Since boxing is such a high intensity sport, you need to have a proper recovery plan in order to succeed.
Follow these simple tips for boxing recovery and you’ll be at the top of your game physically and mentally!
Tips For Boxing Recovery
Follow these tips to speed up your recovery time after boxing:
- Stretch Often
- Have a Balanced Diet
- Get Consistent Sleep
- Take Rest Days
- Take Off-Seasons
Doing all five of these will maximize your recovery process speed and will reduce your risk of injury.
These tips target your entire body, inside and out, physically and mentally.
Remember that some of these tips will affect the others. For example, having an inconsistent diet will affect your sleep schedule.
On the other hand, not getting enough sleep will mess up your diet as well.
Stretch Often
First, stretch often to speed up your recovery time.
You should stretch before boxing to warm up, get the blood flowing, and prevent injuries.
After your boxing workout, stretch again to cool down and start the recovery process.
You’ll feel delayed onset muscle soreness the day after an intense workout, but this is normal. Research shows that soreness isn’t due to lactic acid buildup, but rather stress and microtears.
At home, target sore muscles with a foam roller or massage gun to stimulate blood flow in your muscle fibers.
Stretching is also the best way to listen to your body and find out what parts of it are under intense stress.
For example, mild muscle soreness and inflammation after a workout is normal, but lingering, intense soreness can indicate a muscle strain.
Have a Balanced Diet
Next, having a balanced diet is essential to your muscle repair process.
After boxing training, you need to replenish your energy with different nutrients and replace the water in your body that you sweat out.
During training and before a fight boxers eat:
- Complex carbohydrates (fruits, whole grains, vegetables)
- Plenty of water
- Protein (yogurt, fish, eggs)
- Healthy fats (fish, nuts, eggs)
Once you set this foundation, you can supplement with protein and creatine for enhanced muscle recovery.
Get Consistent Sleep
Next, getting consistent sleep will speed up your recovery time.
Sleep is overlooked and underrated by athletes in all sports as a training tool.
It’s tempting to give up sleep so you can train as much as you can, but doing so will have a negative effect on your performance.
According to research, athletes perform best after eight hours of sleep for full physical and mental health benefits.
Other studies have shown that athletes who had trouble sleeping before a big event tended to perform worse.
More than allowing your body to rest physically, sleep is when your mind turns your training into muscle memory and boxing instinct.
In line with the first tip, stretch in the morning as you wake up and before you go to sleep at night for maximum recovery.
Take Rest Days
Next, take rest days to maximize your boxing recovery.
Training for seven days straight will kill your creativity and make your training a chore.
Since you’re in it for the long term, at least one day of rest will repair muscle damage and will prevent common boxing injuries and burnout.
Even the greatest boxers, like Muhammad Ali and Floyd Mayweather, made sure to take at least one rest day a week.
Some people feel off or have trouble sleeping if they don’t get any exercise.
If that’s you, implement an active recovery process with:
- Yoga
- Functional weightlifting
- Sauna sessions
- Ice baths
If boxing is your priority, don’t overexert yourself and max out your squat or bench press.
The key is to increase your body’s blood flow so that nutrients can reach your damaged muscles.
Take Off-Seasons
Lastly, take off-seasons to maximize your boxing recovery.
If you’ve ever been injured, you know that this isn’t as silly as it sounds.
We all know the typical image of a boxer, constantly running miles, always shadowboxing whenever you see a reflection, etc.
But we like to treat it like any other sport and take a break every once in a while, happy with our progress.
When you come back to boxing, you’ll be well-rested with new ideas and experiences under your belt.
Conclusion
Now that you know these simple tips, you’ll be recovering quicker after every boxing workout.
To gain maximum benefits, follow all of these tips at once! Again, remember that some of these tips will affect the others.
For example, having an inconsistent diet will affect your sleep cycle. On the other hand, not getting enough sleep will make you hungrier.
Your body is amazing and capable of achieving many things, but it will break down with repeated high impact if you don’t take care of it.
If you don’t plan for rest days, you’ll be forced to take a rest day eventually by way of injury or burnout.
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